The Threads of Magic by Alison Croggon (best ereader for pdf and epub .txt) 📕

PIP DRAINED HIS CIDER AND FROWNED INTO HIS empty pewter mug. At least in the Crosseyes Alehouse there wasn’t a cockroach at the bottom, which had happened more than once at the Duck, but this did nothing to cheer him. Even the weight of the coins hidden under his jacket didn’t lift his mood.

He was killing time waiting for El, who had gone shopping. El had chosen the venue to meet, one of the more respectable public houses in the Choke Alleys, and Pip wasn’t in the mood. Right now he wanted to go home. He didn’t feel like talking to anyone.

Jack Ranciere, apothecarist to gentlefolk, scowled at him from across the room and muttered something. Pip didn’t respond. If he started an argument with Jack, it wouldn’t stop. Jack had been accusing Pip for years of stealing from him, an accusation Pip hotly denied with all the fervor of someone who, for once, was actually innocent. He had stolen from quite a few people in this room, but never from Jack. He turned away, leaning his elbow on the wonky table — a plank balanced precariously on two barrels — and gave the other patrons a misanthropic survey.

“Want another jug?”

It was Oni, El’s best friend. She had recently found work at the Crosseyes and now lived in a small apartment by herself, not far from the inn.

Pip looked up unsmilingly into her dark eyes. “Why not?”

Oni picked up the jug. “Is El coming on here?”

Pip shrugged instead of answering, and Oni flashed him a look. “No need to be rude. I just asked.”

Pip relented. Oni never looked down her nose at him, not like some others. “She’s at the market. She wanted to buy a new scarf for the Midsummer Festival, but she’s taking ages.”

“Oh, you know El. She can never make up her mind. You should have gone with her to help her choose.”

“But I hate trying to help her buy anything.”

“You’ll have to be patient, then. Want something to eat?”

“I said I’d wait.” Oni turned to leave. “No, maybe some bread. Have you got any eggs?”

Oni nodded, already busy with another customer, and Pip returned to his brooding.

When he had given El the money from Olibrandis, she had just assumed he had thrown away the Heart. Why, after all, would he keep such a grisly object?

Pip felt a little guilty because he hadn’t disposed of it. He had walked to the Mascule Bridge and, gripped by a strange reluctance, leaned over the parapet and stared down at the blackish-brown water that flowed sluggishly beneath. He didn’t reach inside his clothes to take out the Heart, but he could feel it there, warmed by his own body heat, as if it were a live thing. Why should he throw it away? Maybe he could still discover what the Heart was and find a way to turn it to their advantage. He thought of the expression on the noble’s face when he had realized they’d lost the treasure. It was important. Really important. Nobles wouldn’t call a mere silver box a treasure; they had rooms full of gold.

He knew that he’d regret it for the rest of his life if he threw the Heart away without even trying to find out why it mattered. He was sure it was magic. Perhaps it was some kind of spell for getting rich, if he could only work out how to use it. He had already noticed how it changed temperature: right now it felt cold, like he had a snowball in his breeches.

After El had left with her basket he’d mooched around the Choke Alleys, wondering who he could ask, discreetly of course, about magic objects. There weren’t any witches left in Clarel. He and El had sometimes suspected that Missus Pledge, the old lady who had given them their apartment, had been a bit magic — there had been one or two strange incidents — but she never said so outright. And anyway, she was dead.

He was halfway through his hard-boiled egg when El arrived at last, flushed and slightly out of breath, her hood drawn low over her face. She slid in next to him on the bench.

“You took your time,” said Pip.

“No need to splutter egg all over me.” El lowered her voice. “I got news. Bad news, Pip.”

“What kind of bad news?”

“You know you went to Olibrandis this morning?” He nodded. “Well, it’s all around the market. He’s dead.”

“Dead? Olibrandis?”

“It must have happened after you went there. I reckon it’s to do with that box. I told you it was bad luck.”

“Probably just a coincidence,” said Pip. “Or maybe it’s just a rumor. He looked right as rain when I saw him.”

“No, listen, Pip. They reckon that he was tied up in his chair and then someone cut his throat — whisht — just like that.” She drew her finger across her neck. “But he wasn’t robbed; stuff was thrown everywhere, but the cash box was still there, and all his jewels, and most everything else, so far as people can tell. Lindy went in to sell some bits and bobs and found him sitting in his chair with blood all over the floor.”

Pip didn’t respond. He had to admit that didn’t sound like a rumor. He felt a stab of sorrow for Olibrandis, whom he had always rather liked. “Did you talk to Lindy?”

“Yes, of course I did. What you think I been doing? But there’s worse. Someone is looking for you. A man cloaked all in black, Lindy said, like an assassin. Asking around the place, looking for a thieving young man called Pip what lives in the Choke Alleys, black hair, short, scrawny, legs like sticks, weasel eyes.”

“Weasel eyes!” Pip was offended.

“He knows your name, Pip. He must have got it from Ollie.”

Pip shifted uncomfortably. “There’s probably hundreds and hundreds of people who look just like that around here. And probably lots of